Chapter 868: Yan Zhusheng

February 2nd, morning.

Li Luo woke from sleep, gazing at the slightly unfamiliar ceiling, his expression still dazed.

He turned his head to look at Ying Chanxi, clinging to him like a koala, and for a moment admired her adorable sleeping face with slightly puffed cheeks, unable to suppress a faint smile.

To be fair, if it had been his own bedroom in 401 next door, he'd actually slept with Ying Chanxi since childhood.

But spending the night at Ying Chanxi's house—in his own memory, it seemed he'd never done it before?

Last night was the first time.

For him, on one hand, his parents had instilled in him since childhood the idea of avoiding impropriety with girls' bedrooms.

Playing inside during the day was fine, but when Ying Chanxi slept, he certainly couldn't just walk in, let alone spend the night with her.

When Ying Chanxi was young, she clung to him too tightly; as she grew older, Ying Zhicheng felt it wasn't right for his daughter to keep sleeping with Li Luo, so he privately asked Lin Xiuhong and Li Guohong to find a solution.

In the end, Li Luo gave Ying Chanxi a small blanket, telling her to hug it instead of him, and only then did he manage to coax her back to her own bedroom to sleep.

Now, when spending the night, Ying Chanxi no longer needed the small blanket or the panda plush—she could simply hold Li Luo all night.

So she'd taken both the blanket and the panda plush to her dorm at Qianjiang University, only bringing them out when she needed to sleep over in the dorm.

Thinking of this, Li Luo couldn't help gently ruffling Ying Chanxi's hair.

But it was still early—over ten minutes before six—so Li Luo didn't rush to wake her; instead, he kept one arm around her and pulled out his phone from beside the bed.

After several days of buildup, the celebration event for "Great Gan Night Patrol" reaching 100,000 average subscriptions, along with its completion countdown, had reached a fever pitch.

Thanks to this wave of exposure and traffic, "Great Gan Night Patrol"'s average subscriptions rose rapidly once again.

If not for the fact that the word count had already grown quite large, dragging down the subscription growth rate with chapter count, the increase might not have been much slower than during the summer break.

Readers' mindsets are often influenced.

When the monthly vote ranking still held sufficient authority, if a novel reached first place on the monthly vote ranking, most readers were willing to give it a try.

Even if they read the beginning and thought it wasn't good, they'd likely think to themselves, "This genre just doesn't suit my taste," or "This protagonist isn't my type," always finding some angle to justify it.

It certainly wasn't because the author wrote poorly—after all, the novel was number one on the monthly vote ranking.

Even as the monthly vote ranking's authority gradually weakened over time, it still retained strong traffic-driving effects.

When Li Luo's "Great Gan Night Patrol" hit 100,000 average subscriptions, the headline proclaimed it the site's top-ranked average subscription novel, naturally drawing even more readers.

Even readers who had once been attracted by its monthly vote number one status, read the beginning, then quit, might try again.

After all, what if he'd misjudged it before?

In short, different readers often had different reasons, but the outcome was always the same.

Whether it was the platform's recommended slots, monthly vote or bestseller rankings, or events like this, they were all essentially providing ever-increasing exposure.

Li Luo, through various snowballing methods, continuously built up this upward momentum, finally reaching the stage of reaping the harvest.

In just a few short days, "Great Gan Night Patrol"'s average subscriptions surged from barely crossing the 100,000 threshold to an additional 10,000+.

For a novel already over three million words long, this increase was extremely dramatic.

But this wasn't yet Li Luo's ultimate goal.

He exited the Qidian app and opened his chat history with his editor.

It showed the conversation he'd had with Qianzhou two days ago.

【Qianzhou】: The new book's promotional page is ready; it'll go live on schedule on the 3rd. How's your backlog?

【Chongran】: OK, don't worry—I've got more than enough backlog.

【Qianzhou】: Hmm, I'm confident about that, but isn't your 100,000 pre-order target a bit too high? What if you don't hit it within half a month?

【Chongran】: You think it's too much?

【Qianzhou】: Fine, fine, I'm just worried, but I'm probably overthinking it—after all, you already have over 60,000 ongoing readers for "Great Gan Night Patrol"; hitting 100,000 pre-orders should be easy.

As Li Luo scanned the chat log, he was about to send his editor a message when he heard what sounded like knocking at the door.

He froze, listened carefully, and confirmed someone was indeed knocking.

He quickly threw off the covers, preparing to get up, but Ying Chanxi clung tightly to him.

Ying Chanxi had now woken up, opened her eyes, and asked: "Where are you going?"

"Someone's knocking at the door. I'm going to see who it is."

"Ah?" Ying Chanxi instantly snapped awake, panic flashing across her face as if caught sneaking a secret romance.

But then she calmed down—after all, her relationship with Li Luo had nothing to hide.

It was just rare to sleep together in her own home, giving her a fleeting illusion of returning to the past.

Still, she thought—if back in middle or high school, she'd secretly slept with Li Luo, it would've been a little thrilling.

Too bad time couldn't reverse; otherwise, she'd have tried it.

Thinking this, Ying Chanxi nodded and said: "Then go ahead. I wonder who it is."

"True, no one probably even knows we're sleeping here," Li Luo said, still wondering if it could be Ying Zhicheng coming back for something.

Sleeping at Ying Chanxi's house—if Ying Zhicheng saw him, Li Luo still felt a bit uneasy.

Maybe this was the feeling of a personal domain?

After all, Li Luo had been a little afraid of Ying Zhicheng as a child.

Thinking this, Li Luo reached the door, opened it, and glanced outside—only to see Yan Zhusheng standing there in a down jacket and cotton pants, looking up at him.

Li Luo: "... Didn't you say last night you'd go back this morning? Why did you come over again?"

"The twenty-four hours are up," Yan Zhusheng said flatly. "I didn't come over before midnight—I'm already being respectful to my sister."

With that, Yan Zhusheng squeezed through the doorway, hooked the door shut with her foot, and flung herself into Li Luo's arms.

While hugging him, she quietly slipped off her down jacket, then stood on tiptoe and pinned him against the wall, kissing him fiercely.

Ying Chanxi, who had been sleeping in the bedroom, noticed Li Luo had been gone too long and suddenly felt something was wrong; she hurried out of bed and rushed into the hallway—only to witness this scene at the front door, and her anger flared instantly.

"Zhusheng!" Ying Chanxi hurried forward. "Why did you come all the way over here?"

【61】 "Because my sister's being mean," Yan Zhusheng finally released Li Luo, turning to face Ying Chanxi. "You said I could give you Li Luo for one day, so you secretly brought him here to sleep? I didn't even take him out overnight the day before yesterday."

"But you didn't say no, either." Ying Chanxi glanced nervously to the side, avoiding Yan Zhusheng's gaze, her voice dropping slightly. "Didn't you agree when Li Luo called you last night?"

"I just didn't want to hear the sound of you eating ice pops." Yan Zhusheng squinted at Ying Chanxi with a hint of disdain. "Those are just the tricks you and my senior left behind—you still seem to enjoy them."

"You—" Ying Chanxi's face flushed crimson at those words, utterly humiliated. She clenched her fists tightly, as if gripping something missing. "Stop talking nonsense! I—I didn't…"

"You know best whether you did or not." Yan Zhusheng had no patience to argue further, only leaned against the doorframe and urged, "It's time."

"Hmph!" Ying Chanxi seized the opening to end the topic, quickly turned away, and hurried into the bathroom. Despite the freezing winter, she washed her face with cold water to cool down her burning cheeks.

Li Luo suppressed his laughter, patted Yan Zhusheng's small butt, signaled her to sit and wait a moment, then followed her into the bathroom to wash up together.

…

After the morning run and breakfast downstairs, Yan Zhusheng snatched Li Luo away, making him get into her car to go home.

Ying Chanxi, feeling guilty, didn't dare to compete—she drove herself to the office.

Xu Youyu slept soundly, completely unconcerned about where Li Luo had spent the night. She didn't get up until just after ten in the morning, yawning as she washed up, then came to the study to pet the cats.

At that moment, Li Luo came down from the fourth-floor piano room, where she had just been doting on Yan Zhusheng, and said to Xu Youyu: "Your work symposium's been scheduled for late February—you'll have to wait until after the New Year."

"Oh." Xu Youyu wasn't particularly bothered—everything was handled by Li Luo; she just needed to write well.

Right now, her only focus was finishing "Gu Dao Changqing" as soon as possible, so she could fully devote herself to preparing her next book.

"The Association's official WeChat account and magazines have all published news about this batch of key provincial works under support—it's a small bit of promotion," Li Luo said simply. "It won't boost your ratings much, but it might help a little with copyright negotiations."

Xu Youyu nodded in understanding, hugged A Li in both arms, played with her for a while, then, once A Li wriggled free, she reached for Bai Ge.

After petting all four kittens in turn, she sat contentedly in her chair, propped her feet on Li Luo's thighs, and reclined comfortably.

"It's not urgent anyway—my mortgage isn't that much."

"If your next book really gets tens of thousands of average subscriptions like you said, paying off the mortgage would be a breeze."

"Even if the copyright doesn't sell this time, it doesn't matter—but don't let it mess up the copyright operations for 'Da Gan Xunye Si'."

"Relax, I've got it under control." Li Luo toyed with Xu Youyu's soft, pale feet, gently stroking her plump calves, unable to resist pinching them lightly—her skin felt wonderful. "After the New Year, the Association will hold its annual provincial work evaluation."

"We'll submit both our books. With me involved, securing a slot won't be a problem."

"That, plus the annual work award you already won at the conference, gives you some leverage."

"This isn't just to help you pay off your mortgage sooner—it's paving your way."

"After all, I still want to see you become a Platinum author."

Li Luo smiled as he looked at Xu Youyu.

In his past life, Xu Youyu became a Grandmaster only after graduating college. This life, with Li Luo's help, she'd advanced three or four years ahead.

As for Platinum status—that she'd never reached, even by the time Li Luo was reborn.

Many years had passed in between, and she'd never produced a blockbuster phenomenon; she always lost out to other authors.

This might have been because Li Luo had lost her 800,000 yuan… or perhaps because her other investments also kept losing money—either way, she just wasn't focusing her mind on writing.

So if possible, Li Luo hoped Xu Youyu would reach Platinum as soon as possible—write one true blockbuster first.

As for stock trading, investments—just forget them. Don't even think about such nonsense.

Thinking of this, Li Luo couldn't help asking: "By the way, you haven't put more money into the stock market, have you?"

"Put more money where?" Xu Youyu rolled her eyes. "I took it all out to pay the down payment on the house! My royalties are all going toward daily expenses and mortgage payments—where would I get extra cash to trade stocks?"

"Hmm." Li Luo nodded in satisfaction. "Good. Don't trade."

But after saying that, he felt uneasy and asked again: "Really didn't?"

"Cough… cough…" Xu Youyu shifted her gaze away, avoiding Li Luo's eyes.

Li Luo saw right away something was off. "Tell me the truth, okay?"

"Aww, why are you so controlling? It's my own money—we're not even married yet, and you're already managing me?" Xu Youyu pouted in protest.

"How much money is left in your stock account?" Li Luo ignored her and asked directly.

Seeing his serious expression, Xu Youyu sighed and held up five fingers.

"Five hundred?"

"How could it be…"

"Five thousand? That's small change—fine."

"Of course not." Xu Youyu rolled her eyes. "Five thousand counts as stock trading? It's fifty thousand."

"Oh, fifty thousand." Li Luo's mood eased slightly at the number. "Fine, you can do whatever you want with that fifty thousand—just don't put any more in."

"Fine, fine." Xu Youyu huffed.

Mainly because she had no extra cash left—she was waiting for this month's royalties to replenish her funds.

This month's royalties were over a hundred thousand yuan—fifty thousand went into the stock market as a trial, the rest would be kept… Xu Youyu thought to herself, her eyes darting around.

It was still hard to make her truly give up this "investment and wealth management" endeavor.